1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to ink jet printers and consumable components used with them.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, ink jet printers have become widely used in the graphic arts industry. This has been mainly due to continuing increases in quality and throughput achievable with ink jet printers at a cost which is competitive with more traditional graphic arts production processes.
It can be appreciated that many different parameters affect the print quality achievable in ink jet printing. These parameters include ambient environmental conditions such as temperature and humidity. Also, the type of ink and type of media affect the results of the print process. In currently available ink jet printers, the user must consider these various parameters and adjust printer operation accordingly in order to maximize print quality. Although an experienced user of such printers can produce high quality prints, and maximize print speeds, considerable training and experience is required to optimize print operations.
Some efforts have been made to address this problem. For example, a small amount of intelligence has been built into ink jet printer components, most commonly the ink cartridge itself. In these systems, information such as ink color, remaining ink volume, nozzle information, etc. is provided to the printer from a memory element on the ink cartridge itself.
In some proposed printing systems, selected aspect of a printer""s configuration are automatically controlled based on sensed environmental conditions. One such system is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,617,516 to Barton. In this patent, some xe2x80x9coperational subroutinesxe2x80x9d such as the frequency of printhead wiping and flushing are varied depending on current temperature and humidity values. U.S. Pat. No. 5,428,379 to Kaneko, et al. describes a system using fuzzy logic to control printer operation in accordance with several sensed parameters.
The present invention includes a printer having one or more intelligent components. With this system, the interaction between the ink, the media being printed on, and the environment are more fully addressed. Furthermore, the present system provides the user with desirable information regarding the status of the print job being performed, producing a more comprehensive printer optimization system than has been previously available.
The intelligent components advantageously allow automatic and/or easy manual printer optimization as well as feedback to the printer operator regarding print status, run time, etc. A printing system according to one aspect of the present invention thus retrieves information concerning ink and media characteristics as well as environmental parameters to automatically adjust aspects of the printing process in order to maximize print quality and optimize print speeds while reducing the required set up time and user training and education.
In one advantageous embodiment, the roll of media to be printed on has embedded intelligence in the form of a memory element, and the invention comprises an ink jet printer having a roll of media mounted thereon, wherein the roll of media comprises a memory element. Because the roll of media is in motion during the printing process, the memory element on the media roll holder advantageously comprises a writable RF identification tag embedded in an insert attached to an end of the roll holder. This eliminates any need to form electrical connections between an integrated circuit memory element and the printer electronics. An RF transceiver incorporated into the printer reads the information coded in the identification tag and writes information about media use to the RF identification tag. The memory element may store information regarding compatibility with certain inks, the amount of media remaining, and the thickness of the media. This information, which is made available to the printer in accordance with some embodiments of the present invention, provides the capacity for automatic printer optimizations which were previously unavailable.
Additionally, a printer according to the present invention may include environmental sensing devices such as a temperature and/or humidity sensor. From this information, dew points may be calculated, and suitable print speeds derived form the calculated dew point.
The intelligent components may also include one or more replaceable ink jet cartridges each having a memory element with ink information stored therein. When combined with an embedded memory element in the roll of media to be printed, ink/media compatibility may be judged. In addition, with information about the ink, media, and environmental conditions, a variety of parameters can be automatically adjusted to optimize printer performance without user intervention.
In one embodiment, the memory element is a multi-bit binary code formed by traces on a flex circuit attached to the ink jet cartridge. This system stores a limited amount of information, but is especially inexpensive to produce, and requires modifications to existing ink jet cartridges which do not significantly impact the interface between the ink jet cartridge and the print carriage it mounts to.
In another embodiment of the invention, the memory element on the ink jet cartridge is an integrated circuit memory which interfaces with printer electronics with a two wire connection. This embodiment allows a much wider range of information to be stored in the memory element. Preferably, the mounting of the memory element is such that a conductive connection between the memory element and the printer electronics is created automatically when the cartridge is installed in a xe2x80x9cdrop and clickxe2x80x9d type cartridge receptacle on a print carriage. Accordingly, the memory element may be mounted on a dedicated section of flex circuit which is secured to a face of the ink jet cartridge which interfaces with a mating segment of flex circuit secured to the print carriage. In such an embodiment, mounting is accomplished to minimize mechanical interference between the memory element and the print carriage when the cartridge is installed.
Advantageously, a variety of optimizations may be performed in an ink jet printer according to the present invention. Information regarding media can allow for adjustments in print carriage height, or can provide a basis for print data modification to correct for color aberrations produced by using different substrate colors. Also, ink/media mismatches can be detected and an operator warned before proceeding.